Forget Kitchen Confidential. Forget Restaurant Impossible. We’re talkin’ Restaurant Intervention. As in a full -on, Dr. Phil-style “What were you THINKIN’?!” intervention. Cue the lights and cameras and microphones. Bring out the manager.

“Do you understand why you’re here?”

“Huh…”

“Just what were you thinkin’, exactly – the night you served this party of six? ”

“Well, uh…”

“Ok, so maybe you’re not the brightest light in the socket. Let me help you out here. Do you think it’s acceptable to have guests greeted to an empty hostess station?”

“Uh…”

“Ok, so maybe the hostess was busy…somewhere…other than her assigned station at the front door greeting guests and welcoming them to your fine establishment. What about beverage service. Is it typical practice for your waitstaff to serve sparkling wine vertically, allow the resulting foam to spill over the hands of the server and onto the tableware of the guests, then proceed to pour said dripping, foaming bottle of wine into red wine, rather than adjacent sparkling wine glasses?”

“Well, I sent out the bartender to help him out.”

“Right. And then she promptly returned to her station. Leaving…Ok, so maybe your waitstaff doesn’t have a clue about wine service. What about food service…is it typical to take guest orders, then return minutes later to ‘verify’ the orders?”

“Well, uh…”

“Ok, so maybe the waiter on hand has a poor memory or illegible handwriting or perhaps suffers from amnesia…which will be a good thing after reading this review…but I digress. So back to food service. Is it typical to have guests wait for over 45 minutes for their meals? And once those excrutiatingly overdue dinners arrive, is it common practice to serve them lukewarm, with the proteins undercooked?”

“Uh…”

“Ok, so maybe the issue fell to a possibly overburdened kitchen staff cooking for the rest of the 2/3 full restaurant that weekend night…or not. What about the executive decision made by you, the manager, when apprised of the above-mentioned debacle, to offer our party of six a ‘free dessert’ for enduring “Survivor – The Restaurant Version” filmed live on location in Villa Creek? A dessert for our troubles? Really?

Frankly, you’ve got a lot of ‘splainin’ to do to the rest of your guests, those guests with a whole lotta other fine dining options in Paso Robles, CA. – options that actually live up to their promises, not their hype. Bon Appétit!